


rebellions start in a heartbeat

by spacecleavage



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Medieval, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-13
Updated: 2018-02-13
Packaged: 2019-03-17 17:18:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13663671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacecleavage/pseuds/spacecleavage
Summary: In a corrupt kingdom, a daring young rebel and a sheltered lady (or princess if you will) meet, on a mission to change the fate of the kingdom.





	rebellions start in a heartbeat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MercuryM](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MercuryM/gifts).



> prompt:- i think right now i prefer it to be canon or medieval/regency. i’ve been reading the queen’s thief series by megan whalen turner and i’m all for some thief/assassin!aus or reluctantly starting a rebellion together, or magical exiled person of interest
> 
> i had fun with this prompt, and kind of twisted it a little bit but yeah :)
> 
> hope you like it.

Clarke rolled the blade of straw between her fingers, so hard it disintegrated. She needed something else to distract her, lest she began to think about… anything. Her arrest and upcoming execution, her life before, the truth about her father… the guard.

NO! Her wrists jerked, trying to reach for anything that would distract her. The manacles around her wrists made a jarring sound as she grasped at the bare ground around them. She tried not to yell as she realized what that meant.

She could still taste the jailor’s brew on her tongue, he had told her that the bitter brew would punish her for her crime by making her relive it over and over again. She’d found the best way to delay it was the distraction. It couldn’t be something little like staring at the metal grate that kept her away from the rest of the world. No, the ones that worked best were the tactile distraction, Clarke found that straw, or more specifically destroying the straw worked best. Though, the rough texture of the manacles and even poking herself with a sharp rock could work if she was desperate.

But she was beyond desperate as the started to creep in at the edge of her vision. No, no, no, she chanted to herself, but it was already too late.

_It was pouring rain outside, and while normally that wouldn’t put a damper on her spirits, her mother had forbidden her from leaving the castle and told her in no uncertain terms that if she went out riding, that she’d be locked in her room for a week with only Roma as a companion. So Clarke had found herself wandering the halls, searching for something, anything to entertain her._

_She lamented the fact that Wells had been forced to travel back to his own estate, as she could have visited him and made him read to her as she drew. Even Sir Nathan would have been better because then she could have at least had a companion for her silence, but he had been forced to go on patrol._

_So here she was, wandering the halls, stopping to admire old artwork and going so far as to critique some of the pieces. Wells had always said that she would be better than half the court artists, she tended to agree with him for the most part. There was one exception, however, the only painting by the artist, a portrait of a forgotten Chancellor. She didn’t even know the name of the artist, their only mark, a CC in the bottom left corner. She had an overwhelming urge to go and view the piece, stare at it until she became completely lost in it._

_So, absorbed in her thoughts of finding it, she didn’t even realize there was someone in front of her until she found their arms wrapped around her, keeping her from falling onto the stone floor._

_She looked up to thank her savior and rather stereotypically became completely lost in him. His dark eyes drew her in and seemed to show his very soul, and such a soul it was, with rippling darkness and spots of light so bright it seemed to blind her, the complexity and brilliance that lay within him astounded her. And while she gazed into his soul, he gazed right back, seeing her strength, her determination, and her weakness._

_She pulled herself back, breaking the connection. Clarke curled around herself defensively, and the hardness and propriety of court settled over her. She took in his rank, the older rusted chainmail, the stained tunic and worn boots, a palace guard by the look of him and a lowly one at that._

_“Watch where you are going, guard.”_

_“Please, I beg your forgiveness, Princess.” He mocked her. Clarke tried not to balk at the response. He was clearly new here; such words could easily cause you to lose a tongue or a hand._

_“Mind your tongue, lest you lose it.” She warned softly before she spoke a little louder. “Where are you going?”_

_“Milady?” His eyes widened, a confused look settled across his face._

_“Where are you going guard? You are obviously new, and all your work should be by the gate, definitely not here by the Chancellor’s rooms.”_

_“We’re near the Chancellor’s rooms?” His interest piqued, and Clarke’s fear grew. Something wasn’t right here, everything about this seemed wrong. Clarke looked at him again, and she saw it all. His borrowed uniform, his common language, everything about him pointed to something else._

_A thief, her mind provided. What should I do then? Tell an actual guard? Direct him to a guard? Flee? Or could she… the stories that she heard the servants talking about the king’s rule and she’d seen the Chancellor whispering in the King’s ear… maybe he could stand to be taken down a little bit._

_Clarke knew which one she should do, what logic dictated to her, but Clarke was an artist, and logic wasn’t involved in art._

_She gave the directions, and that became her first crime against the king._

She stretched her hand out further, causing pain to spread along the connective tissue in her hands and down into her wrists as she grasped one of the only bits of straw that she could.

She rolled it in her fingers, feeling the structure of it come apart beneath them. It was enough, this is enough she thought to herself. She told herself over and over again. However, soon it was gone just like all the others and there were no other blades within reach.

The memory came quickly this time, it did not focus on her thoughts like it did last time, just the memory itself.

_She was staring at the painting by CC, the forgotten Chancellor with their hair the color of a dark storm cloud, so dark in places you would almost mistake for black except for the silver sheen to it and eyes darker than the depths of the world. She stared at it and tried to appear lost in it. Not something hard for her, given her history of studying paintings… but something she tried to maintain, nonetheless._

_She could not make it look like she was waiting, to see if the guard had succeeded in his quest._

_She had waited a long time before she finally heard hurried footsteps rushing down the hallway._

_The guard rounded the corner; his dark hair was stuck to his forehead, worry marring his face and blood staining his hands._

_So caught up in trying to escape, he did not even see her as he came closer._

_“Hey!” She called to him softly, reaching out to grab his hands before he could pass her. “What happened?”_

_“I did it. I completed my mission.”His stared blankly at her. He reached out for her in return, his hands grasping at her forearms._

_“Did what? What did you do? Guard, what did you?”_

_“Bellamy, my name is Bellamy and I killed the Chancellor.”_

_“What?!” She froze, this isn’t what thought was happening… “You have to get out of here, go through the servant’s quarters.”_

_He stared at her, understanding what she was giving him._

_“Thank you, I don’t have-”_

_“You have to go, now!” She cut him off. “Flee!”_

_And so he did. Moving faster than she’d seen anyone move in a while._

_She followed his lead, disappearing back to her room, far away from this part of the castle. But it did not help. They searched the castle from top to bottom, and in her room they found it… the dress she wore when she met Bellamy, the one stained with the blood of the Chancellor._

She came out of the memory spinning. It was the one she saw most often, the greater betrayal according to the King and the new Chancellor. Though she knew the truth now, her first crime was enough to hang for but the second one… that one led to this torture.

Clarke bit her tongue hard, she didn’t want to think anymore, she wanted the blissful break of sleep. Not to think of her father, whose body probably still hung from the outside of the castle, for his crimes against the king…

Her mother told her that the king had sent him away, claiming that he had an important mission to attend. Clarke had seen through her mother’s flimsy excuses, but she’d naively thought that he’d been banished.

She knew the truth now; her old cellmate had been more than happy to tell her in excruciating detail about how her father had died.

“Clarke, can you hear me?”

She opened her eyes, twisting her head towards the noise. Sir Nathan Miller, son of David, the Captain of the guard and someone she had considered a friend of sorts.

“Nate?” She didn’t understand, was this some new tricks of the jailor? Some kind of waking vision? She shut her eyes against it. This vision would not draw her in, and she would not do this to herself. “No.”

“Clarke, I need you to get up. The jailor won’t be unconscious for much longer.”

She buried the heel of her palms into her eyes. She wanted to tell the vision no, wanted to scream at it to leave her alone. However, she couldn’t interact with it. She would not interact with it.

She heard the clanging of the cell door open and the sound of leather boots scraping on the stone floor.

A hand pulled at the shackles on her wrists and she flinched away from it.

“Clarke?” This voice was different, it sounded like…

The guard.

Clarke was barely able to open her eyes, looking into the eyes that had caused all of this. Her eyes closed a second later as she fainted.

Bellamy Blake had no choice but to pick her up and take her away from this place

-BSV-

Bellamy tried not to stare at her as she lay in his cot.

He wished he could have laid her in a soft bed, surrounded by pillows and blankets, like she deserved. The cell she was kept in; was worse than the ones that they kept their prisoners in, when Nate led him through the castle, he’d been able to smell the prison five minutes before they had reached her.

He tried not to think about how he found her, the rank smell, the chafing around her wrists that was so bad that it had broken the skin, her hair was stuck in ratty ringlets, she looked so gaunt and dehydrated that he had almost blown the whole mission by rushing her out of the castle. When he had finally got her back their camp, he’d given her straight to Harper, who’d taken over as their healer after Jackson had been captured. He had barely been able to part with her.

It was irrational to have feelings for her. He hardly knew her and she definitely didn’t know him. However, it almost felt like he did, from the small stories Nate had told him and the way she …

There was so much that she had done for him; helping him find the Chancellor had been no small feat on her part, recalling the bloom of realisation crossing her face, and then helping him escape, he’d been so shocked after actually killing the Chancellor that he could not recall how to escape from the castle. She’d helped him and been caught tried and on her way to the executioner’s block and all for him, a man she didn’t even know.

He felt such a connection with her, almost like he had known her in another life. He reached out to brush a curl behind her ear.

Woah, this is far too familiar and just plain creepy.

He backed out of his tent. He was being weird, and that wasn’t going to happen.

-BSV-

Clarke studied the crude image in front of her.

“Bellamy, would you look at this?”

He pulled in beside her, leaning into her. “What?” He frowned at the wanted poster.

“You’d think after living in the castle for 9 years, they’d be able to draw me accurately?”


End file.
